Where men wish to become demons and vice versa. And where exchanging roles results in nothing. This is the concept at the root of this story of demons in all their female glory.
The perfect follow up to Painted Skin directed in 2008 by Gordon Chan, Andy Chin and Danny Ko, this version maintains the narrative premise of the first and reunites the main members of the cast, with the addition of some other marginal characters who do, however, create a whole new atmosphere within the film.
The story follows the wanderings of an ancient fox spirit which has been liberated from its prison of ice where it had been frozen for centuries. The demon – which has taken on the appearance of a beautiful woman – in order to survive and maintain her beauty, must devour the hearts of men she has seduced and killed. Only when she meets someone who voluntarily offers her their heart will the spell be broken, and the demon can be transformed into a human being.
The Big Chill follows the demon’s every step, trying constantly to cover her up with ice again. But a young princess – whose face had been disfigured years earlier by a bear and who has run away from a marriage arranged by her family to save their threatened kingdom – with the warmth which emanates from her heart, saves her. The demon decides to stay with the woman and accompanies her to meet a warrior that the princess is madly in love with. However, the man – despite having been in love with the princess for years and the sense of guilt which torments him for not having been able to protect her from the bear – is immediately struck by the beauty of the demon… The complex dynamics between the princess and the demon provide the literal and metaphorical “heart” of the film. The jealousy the princess feels towards the demon and the envy the latter feels (she too wants to know what love is after having been denied it in her glacial state) is gradually transformed into a mutual understanding and then into female solidarity, to the point where the woman and the demon exchange roles and, as a consequence, become one and the same.
While the dynamics between the two female leads, Zhou Wei and Zhou Xun, are of a rare intensity, giving the actresses the chance to best showcase their performing skills, at the same time, the film underlines the obtuseness of men via weak and feckless male characters. The General, so beloved of the princess, shows great fragility even when, in the end, he punishes himself – by blinding himself – for his emotional blindness, which made him a slave to exterior beauty.
The story is told with great stylistic majesty, using amazing and enjoyable choreography and special effects, with the addition of some loveable secondary characters like the winged demon Quer and the ghost-buster Pang, both very human characters even though they are part of the supernatural world.
The romantic tradition of ghost stories in Chinese literature seems to accompany this film with the representation of two characteristics of modern-day Chinese society: the cult of physical beauty and constant dissatisfaction, which feeds frenzied consumerism. No director other than Wuershan could have been so perceptive in representing this combination; before making his big screen debut, he was the best known director of commercials in China.
Maria Barbieri